Miles Above Us
by Malum Unus
Summary: The Forever Burn: Part I. Join Michael Turner, a former member of a MIA Stargate team, as he chronicles his last year alone in the Pegasus Galaxy, or so he thinks to be the Pegasus galaxy
1. Chapter 1

Stargate Atlantis:

Miles Above Us

The Forever Burn

Chapter 1:

Part I:

What to reflect on? How much more could they have done? Maybe They were just to late… I cannot think right. I feel as if my brain is about to bust. I can't say that I am not mad. But I knew what I signed up for when I went to Atlantis. Things were going to get bad, and in some cases men, women, the brave people of this mission would sometimes not come back. Thing is, never thought I would be one of those. See, my whole life, I was the one who came back, made it out. The tour I did in Iraq. Being shot at, was never an issue. Bullets seem to just go past me. I was the "lucky" one.

Where was my luck on this one… I suppose it just ran out. Sgt. Arthur Michael Turner's luck had run out.

It had only been about four weeks since I had started active duty on Atlantis. It was my second mission, and we were heading for a planet for some biological samples that Dr. Beckett needed for his research on… well something or other. I was not really big on the whole research aspect of the missions. Don't get me wrong, I liked the whole idea of finding new or lost discoveries.

I just liked the whole action and adventure part of the job. Needless to say I did not become one of the few Army units on Atlantis for the research.

The mission started out well enough. From what I could tell, just a routine job, Myself, Jacob, Shrin, a soldier that was from the same planet as Teyla , Marcus, and Maj. Paul Franks, our commanding officer. There were also scientist, but for the life of Me, I cannot remember.

The planet was lush, plenty of trees, much like a rainforest back on earth. After arriving through the gate, we were to go ten klicks to the south, retrieve the samples and go back to the gate.. Couldn't be more simple, could it? Wrong. About half way to the selected mission site, one of the science officers started picking up what he called weird energy readings. Of course, protocol says we must investigate, or make note of it, and then we would not get the chance to investigate and someone else would take it and get all the fun out of being with the Stargate program. So with that said, we weren't about to give anyone else a chance to take away a major discovery from us.

We must have walked around that freaking jungle for hours, and soon the day turned into night. All of our equipment was or seemed to be malfunctioning. We were lost. The c.o. decided to call it a night and build camp, by that time, we could not even find the gate, it seemed as if the forest changed around us, every step we took, the step behind us had changed. Camp would be nice, give us a chance to rest our dogs, catch some much needed shut eye, and wait for Stargate Command to make their routine radio checkup.

I must have fallen asleep first. I had not been getting much sleep since coming to Atlantis, always used to the field gear and bedding, guess it would have only been a matter of time before I became used to sleeping in a real bed again. But sleeping outside again came as a relief to me. I finally awoke, and to my surprise, it was 0300, Stargate Command surely should have radioed in by then. I rolled over and saw my C.O. sitting on a fallen tree with his back turned to the camp. I scanned the area, checking my surroundings, everyone else was asleep, except for one of the scientist was missing from my field of vision. I got to my feet, dusted myself off, packed my rifle on my back and walked over to Franks, and sat beside him. Before I could say anything he said "One of the scientist took off in that direction about an hour ago, and something is out there, but it is not him." I could hear something, but it sounded small, no bigger than a common dog. I stood up to go search for the scientist, and Franks immediately told me to sit back down. That was an order, and there was no reason for another person to become lost in the forest, and that we would mount a search party first light, and for me to go back to sleep, that I would need my sleep for morning. I asked him about the radio from command. Nothing. We should have been contacted by then, something was not right.


	2. Chapter 2

The Forever Burn:

Chapter 1:

Part II

Morning came, faster than sleep did. By the time first light hit, everyone had already been awake and was briefed on our situation. Which was, no word from command, and one of our team members had went missing during the night. I couldn't stop myself from thinking what the hell was going on. Not even a month on Atlantis and already, running into something weird and unexplained, but that was what I lived for, danger.

Now that I think about it, things could have been a lot worse, I suppose.

We packed our things, and headed toward the area of forest that the scientist had gone off toward during the night. It was not long after that, when one of the scanners started to work again. A single life sign showing up less than a half klick south of us. It had to have been the scientist that went missing.

As we approached the spot where the life sign had been, we began to see what looked to have been ancient buildings and structures. Something was different about these though. One of the scientist began rattling on about how these building had been different, unlike the buildings of the Lanteans, and how they looked to be much older. At the time, I was not interested in a bunch of old buildings that looked as if they would collapse in on each other at any moment. But one thing did catch my attention, the fact that there seemed to be hardly any vegetation growing on the buildings.. even though there we were, right smack dead in the middle of the densest forest I had ever been in.

We followed the scanner to the life sign, and there he was, hunched over a piece of equipment with his laptop beside him. I grabbed his shoulder, and turned him around, being that he seemed completely oblivious to the fact that we were there. When I saw his face, he must have been seventy years old.

Now, not to say that older people could not do the work that other scientist could do, but I had yet to see anyone that was over the age of sixty, and this man here, was definitely was not that man that left the base camp the previous night.

His face stared into my own, as if he had not seen another person in ages. Come to find out, that exactly had been the case. According to him, he had been there for well over thirty years, with no contact with anyone, not from Atlantis, no one. According to what he could remember, he left that night because of a scanner that was going off, and he had to see what it was, something like he had never seen before. Apparently when he got to the source of the signal, a bright light flashed and after that he tried and tried to find us, but each time only getting lost, and barely finding his way back to the long forgotten city. He went on and on, about how much he had done, how much he had learned. About how the Lanteans were more like us than we had originally thought, and that they had, in their very early stages, had used technology very much the same way that we had been doing with ships, and cities that we had found. That there was a much older civilization that had existed long before they had, and the Lanteans had used their technology to gain ground faster than what would have been normal.

Ok, so the ancients stole some technology, and used it to further their own advancement, so what, isn't that what we were doing in the Pegasus galaxy in the first place? I'm sure that the official word from the IOA would be no, that is exactly not what we were doing, and I would be willing to bet that most of the people working with the Stargate Programs would also say that, but the cold hard truth is that we are.

Alright, here I am, with my team, sitting here with this old man, who just the night before, was younger than my older brother. All I could do was think; what the hell did I get myself into? But the truth is, I was also very excited. This was what it was all about. Now wasn't the time to let my emotions get the best of me, I was, well for lack of a better word, lost, in the middle of a far off galaxy, with very little chance of getting back home.

As the old man led us to his living area, which in all actuality, was nicer that what I had on Atlantis. The hallways began to light up, much like they did in Atlantis, my whole aspect of things changed. That place was huge, and as we walked underground we began to see this place as it truly was. There was a massive central chamber, that looked as if it were one giant dome, in the middle of this dome, there were massive trees. Birds flew around the trees, and I could see from where I was what looked to be dinosaurs type creatures walking around at the very bottom of the chamber. To put things into a ratio, Atlantis could have fit into this center chamber with no problem. The chamber was sealed with what seemed to me to be a very think type of glass, but when I touched it my hand went through it. I do not believe that I have ever seen an old man move so fast, he pulled me back so fast, that I flew across the hallway, hitting the wall opposite of the center chamber. His strength was not that of an old man, but of someone that lives on in the imagination. My ribs hurt, and I had the wind knocked out of me. But just as fast as he threw me, he was over by my side aiding me up. "What the hell was that?" I asked him. All I got in return was "Sorry, I suppose I don't know my own strength." Damn right he didn't. I got to my feet, and asked "How.." and before I finished, he said, "after so many years, a man gets bored." I wouldn't know what that meant until later on.

My ribs still hurt as we walked into what seemed to be a large meeting room. The old man offered everyone something to eat and drink. I needed something, so I said sure. To my surprise, he asked what I wanted, like we were at a freaking bar or something, so laughingly I said "rum and coke" he said nothing to me and walked over to what looked to be a telephone booth and spoke into the front of it, "rum and coke" and poof, like magic, appeared a glass with brown liquid in it. Everyone was well, I don't know about everyone, but I was stunned. To see something like that here, I mean come on. I stood up, as did the other scientist in the group, and walked to the machine. "What else can this machine make, Doc?" "Anything you can imagine" He replied.

So that night we sat there, eating what we wanted, and talking about what had been doing to pass the time. And then, like I knew it would, we got to the part about how we get home. So quick, and I was just getting used to that place too. Apparently there was Stargate on this planet. But how the heck did we get there if there was not a Stargate here? According to the old man, it was a roaming gate, every few times that gate address is dialed, it transports itself to a random planet and therefore gave us no chance to make it back home through the gate. We were stuck there. Well for the time being. And then it got really confusing. He started to explain that the facility that we were at was abandoned long ago, far long before the ancients even began their explorations of space, and that it was actually never intended to be a manned operations center, just a seeder facility. The people that lived there had only been meant to oversee the day to day operations while the seeding began. But they had left before full seeding could begin. Ok, if you are like me, then you need to understand what seeding is. This place would launch probes into this galaxy. The probe would contain everything needed to produce life. Once the probe hit its destination it would release whatever it was carrying and then the planet would produce life. How did he know all of this?

There were many questions I had, but the only one I wanted to know the answer to, was how we were going to get back to Atlantis. So I asked him. He told us all that he thinks that time goes by differently here, than in the rest of the universe, so it could be that Atlantis did not even exist anymore. That our families would may not even be alive on Earth anymore.

It had only been a few days after getting to the Seeder facility, when one of the other scientist came into the meeting room where Franks and I were planning a recon mission to explore the facility in full, and informed us that there in fact was a gate on this planet, and it was in this facility. That he had found logs inside of one of the facilities data terminals detailing where it was. So, the old Doc happened to be lying to us, Franks was convinced that he was hiding more things and that he was up to something sinister. Things seem have gotten to everyone, making people scared, paranoid. Given, that I myself was a little upset, I wanted to go home just as much as anyone here, but I knew that there had to be a good reason for the old man to be lying to us. But that also means that he lied to us about more things as well, being that the ancients were supposed to be the ones that built the gates, and if this place had a gate, then it meant that it was built by the ancients. And not the Mother race, as he so called them.

As the scientist led us to where he said the gate was, we were interrupted by the old man standing at the door that led to the where the gate was. He was standing there, with his arms crossed and a look on his face like we had caught a child with his hand in the cookie jar. "now look here, we just want to see what is on the other side of that door, if it may be a chance that we can find a way back in there, then we need to get in there." Franks told him. At that moment, the old man jumped for Franks, hitting him and knocking him out. I fired my machine gun at Him, hitting him twice in the abdomen.


	3. Chapter 3

The Forever Burn:

Part III

Michael lay there on the ground. After being hit by the old man, he had been knocked out as well. Things seemed to be getting weirder at every moment.

When Michael came to, the scientist that had told him of the hidden Stargate was working at a panel next to the door, trying hard to get it open. "What's the deal?' Michael said, while rubbing his head. Michael looked for Franks, not seeing him he asked the scientist where he was. "I don't know, He was gone when I woke up." "You don't think that he would have taken him? Do You?" "I, I, have no idea, like I said, he was gone when I woke up." Michael got to his feet, showing his aggravation while standing up. His shoulders hurt, harder to breathe with each breath. The air tasted hard and old. He reached for his canteen on the side of his pack. Opened the lid and took a few drinks of the cold water inside.

As he walked toward the door the scientist proclaims; "I got it" and the door slid open. Michael stood in the walkway of the once closed door, amazed by what he saw. A massive ring, at least twice the size of the Stargate on any other planet, It was made out of a type of crystal. Michael felt a feeling of awe come over him as the room began to light up and reveal what seemed to be another massive chamber that was filled with the oversized Stargates. The chamber reminded Michael of the puddle jumper bays on Atlantis, only instead of ships, there were hundreds of Stargates. As he looked up, he saw something jump from one side of the chamber to the other. Michael raised his gun, and took aim. Before he could even get a shot off, the creature was right in front of him. Michael was stunned to see what appeared to be a young woman, a very beautiful one on top of that.

"Please do not fire, I mean You no harm." The young woman said. "My name is Akana, and I am the caretaker, or should I say I was the caretaker of this place before I was locked in here by Stephen." Stephen was the name of the old scientist whom had went missing from the camp the night before Michael had came to this place. "How long have you been here?" Michael asked her. Michael could not help but look into her eyes, the cold deep blue of them were like paradise to him. Her hair hung in front of her face and looked so perfectly groomed. Surely Michael though, it could not have been long. "I have been here for approximately: 207 years, 3 months, 27 days, 13 hours, and 27 minutes. In your time of course." Michael couldn't believe it. She had been in there for over two hundred years. How could this have been, she had not a scratch on her nor were the clothes that she was wearing even dirty.

Michael wanted some sort of explanation, and since he couldn't trust a word that Stephen had said, and wasn't quite sure if he could trust Akana, he figured what the hell, go ahead and try the version he had yet to hear.

As Akana began explaining to Michael what exactly she was, he still could help himself to become submersed into her every word. He had never felt anything like this.

Akana was an android, programmed to make sure the facility was running correctly, and all the maintenance was preformed for the term of the seeding facilities operations period. But she was put into a hibernation mode before the facility could be brought online. Stephen had activated her when he first arrived there. She also explained that Stephen had been taking the regeneration therapy that was integrated into the facility for workers that were working on the construction. With the therapy, he was able to live longer, become stronger and faster. She also explained that the facility was not for seeding life, but for seeding every universe with a dimensional gate providing safe and efficient travel from one dimension to the other. The creators of the gates had planned on using the gates in the hopes that all dimensions would be aware of the other. Due to leadership changes in the "Mother" Race's governing bodies, the plan was scrapped and the facility was shut down before it could be started up.

Most of the things that Akana spoke of, Michael had no idea, but the scientist that had opened the door, he was taking everything in. He knew or understood almost everything that she was talking about. Michael felt a little jealous, so he just sat there listening to whatever came out of her mouth, and chiming in only when necessary. Akana warned Michael that if Stephen was allowed to continue the therapy, that he would become an unstable form of energy, and after that, it was anyone's guess. Michael told Akana of Stephen's current condition, and how old he looked. "Interesting" She replied, as if surprised by the fact that he was ageing. Akana walked over to a access panel in the hallway and put her hand out. Long fiber optic cable began to come from the face of the panel, and wrapped around her arm, soon her arm became one with the machine. "Good news" she began. "The regeneration chamber has malfunctioned, and Stephen has not interacted with the healing factor for over twenty years." Michael had guessed that Stephen had been working on the chamber when he first got to the facility. "What happened when he locked you up Akana?" "When I awoke from my hibernation mode, Stephen had already been here for what he said was 2 years, and he couldn't have been happier to see another person. Being that my original design was as a maintenance android, I was awaiting my program input for this specific facility. My knowledge matrix was intact, along with my living species interface. You see, first and foremost, I am to aid any living creature that is in this facility. Stephen needed my help, his mental condition was not safe." The scientist interrupted her; " Ok ok we get the point, Stephen was crazy, I think we all came to that conclusion when he attacked us!" Akara started to talk once more; " I am sorry for my delay, at the time when I was locked in her, Stephen was trying to access the inter-dimensional data base, which requires a level seven or higher clearance pass, that which Stephen does not have. It is a genetic read that I must do to verify. Stephen became upset at my unwillingness to let him have access. Not much time after that, Stephen had activated two of the security droids, he somehow reprogrammed them, and they attacked me. I was unable to prevent damage to myself, and retreated back to the dimensional gate storage room, as I entered the room, Stephen shut the doors behind me. I used the time I had to rebuild my vital circuits and hardware, and interfaced into what control systems I could. Which were not many, mainly security surveillance and the communications systems. I was able to keeps him out of the room, in turn he was able to keep me in. I allowed you to open the door, because I monitored your actions in the hallway when you shot him." Akara had been waiting for the right moment to exit her prison. As she continued her interfacing with the panel, she told Michael where Stephen was. "He is in the security storage room, he has activated over two dozen of the security droids." Stephen was getting ready for something, and Michael knew it wasn't good.


End file.
